Expat Community > Philippines

ACEPoolPlayer
Joined 2012
Posts: 2036

Dealing with the Filipino Law

4 years ago

One of the frequent posters with an Ignominable reputation apparently is having an amnestic syndrome. Let me clarify. I'll tell this factual story only to help other expats that may someday get into a similar situation.

When I was a 1st year medical student in the Philippines right after my final exams (I had already purchased my ticket to go back to New York for summer vacation) I got into a motorcycle accident. I was driving my motorcycle in Metro Manila (Honda 360 fully loaded, crash bars, air horns, cyberlight continuous flashing headlights etc..) when a pedestrian ran across the road in front of me while I was going 35-40 mph. It was a 2-way road. Apparently he looked to the left, saw an opening between jeeps coming down the road and ran across without looking to the right where I was coming from. He ran right into me, I never even had a chance to downshift or hit my brakes. He ran into my left handlebar and crash bars. He went down and I went down. Thank god I had a top of the line "Simpson" helmet on my head because my head hit the ground pretty hard. I was bleeding pretty bad in several areas. Nothing broken. The other guy was on the ground also. From experience of other expats and knowledge that was given to me, I was able to get the motorcycle started, bend a few things in place and slowly drive the heck out of there. It's been known to happen that expats get attacked by Filipinos (relatives, friends or just anyone around) when involved in bad situations, plus the fact that it will be your word against everyone else's word of what happened. Very few Filipinos will side with a foreigner over a Filipino. I went to a hospital near where I was staying, got cleaned up and went home. I was given good advice to try to get my ticket moved up earlier, get out of the country and if necessary handle things from New York. Thank god I left because within 48 hours the police where at my Philippine residence looking for me. I was already on the plane.

If I would have stayed at the accident, they would detain me for who knows how long and I would be under their control to demand whatever they wanted from me. So my best advice (lived 25 years in the Philippines), to every expat if you ever get in any kind of serious situation try not to be detained. Go to your home, contact your Attorney, well known Filipino friends and handle everything from a distance. Once you are detained, you lost all negotiating power and you could be locked up for a long time.

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Dealing with the Filipino Law

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